Table Of ContentT H E O L O G Y A S
D I S C I P L E S H I P
KEITH L. JOHNSON
InterVarsity Press
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©2015 by Keith L. Johnson
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ISBN 978-0-8308-8017-1 (digital)
ISBN 978-0-8308-4034-2 (print)
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Johnson, Keith L.
Theology as discipleship / Keith L. Johnson.
1 online resource.
Includes index.
Description based on print version record and CIP data provided by publisher; resource not viewed.
ISBN 978-0-8308-8017-1 (eBook) — ISBN 978-0-8308-4034-2 (pbk. : alk. paper)
1. Theology, Practical. 2. Christian life. I. Title.
BV4
230—dc23
2015035293
For my students
CONTENTS
Acknowledgments 9
Preface 11
1 Recovering Theology 17
Concerns with Theology 20
What Went Wrong? 24
Rebuilding the Discipline 33
2 Being in Christ 37
Reframing Reality 38
God’s Eternal Plan 45
Theology by Participation 52
3 Partnership with Christ 61
The Pattern of Partnership 62
Life with Christ 70
Theology with Christ 77
4 The Word of God 85
God and Human Words 86
God and Written Words 91
Christ and Scripture 95
Test Case: Jesus and the Pharisees 98
Reading with Christ 103
5 Hearing the Word of God 109
Reading in Love 111
Hearing with the Church 116
Test Case: Circumcision 122
Theology of the Word 128
6 The Mind of Christ 133
The Pattern of Christ’s Mind 135
Imitating Christ 142
Thinking After Christ 149
7 Theology in Christ 155
Subject Index 188
Scripture Index 189
Praise for Theology as Discipleship 192
About the Author 193
More Titles from InterVarsity Press 194
IVP Academic Textbook Selector 195
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
T
his book was written in conversation with my students at Wheaton
College, particularly those who have participated in my introductory
courses. The opportunity to teach them theology has been one of God’s
great gifts to me, because the challenge of doing so has propelled me
further on the path of discipleship. This book is dedicated to them.
I particularly want to acknowledge a few students whose questions
and insights have prompted certain lines of thought in this book. The
importance of figuring out the place of academic theology in the life of
faith became clear to me during conversations with the students from
the Wheaton in the Holy Lands program in the summer of 2009. Those
long hours of discussion and debate on the bus or over coffee form the
background of many of these chapters. I especially want to acknowledge
the contributions of Abby Anderson, Hannah Buchanan, Rebekah Pahl,
Graham Smith, Annika Turner, Garret Zajac and Emily Zeller. Other
students who inspired sections of this book include Sarah Kennedy, who
put into words many of the worries students have about academic the-
ology; Michael Rau and Anna Jacobson, who relentlessly probed me with
questions during my office hours about how theology can be done faith-
fully; Meredith Hawkins, whose integrity and humility showed me what
a faithful theological student looks like; and Libby Boehne, who lives out
much of what I describe in these pages in her life and ministry. To all of
these students—and to so many others who remain unnamed here but
10 Theology as Discipleship
are known to me—I express my deep appreciation.
It is hard to imagine managing my daily life without the help of my
teaching assistants and researchers, including Kathryn Heidelberger and
Genny Austin, who helped me find the time and space to work on this
book. I am also grateful to some outstanding students who offered early
feedback on this manuscript, including Stephen Ticsay, Anna Jacobson
and Sarah Johnson. Sarah in particular made some very helpful editorial
suggestions. The idea for this project arose as the result of conversations
with my colleague Beth Felker Jones about the relationship between
Christian doctrine and practice. She is one of many wonderful scholars
and teachers I work with in the Biblical and Theological Studies De-
partment at Wheaton College. I particularly want to note my colleagues
with offices located on my hallway: George Kalantzis, David Lauber,
Vince Bacote and Gregory Lee. We are united by a love for our students
and a desire to serve Christ and his church, and they make coming to
work each day a lot of fun. Greg also is to be noted for his particularly
helpful suggestions on this manuscript. I also am grateful for the support
and encouragement of several wonderful administrators, including
Jeffrey Bingham, Jill Baumgaertner, Stanton Jones and Philip Ryken.
My friends have been a constant source of encouragement. In this
regard, I make special mention of Kevin Hector, Myles Werntz, Wesley
Keyes, Kevin Roberts, Sean Allen, Chris Thacker, Erin Conaway, Matt
Cook, Josh Haynes, Matt Sciba and Britt Young. I also have benefited
from the support of the editors of InterVarsity Press, including Brannon
Ellis and David Congdon. David in particular offered helpful insights
throughout the process and saved me from more than one mistake.
Finally, I am grateful for the love of Julie, Everett and Blake. The fact
that God has granted me the chance to live life with them shows that he
is a God of grace beyond all measure. I also am thankful for the constant
companionship of my dog Jasper, who slept near my desk as I wrote
much of this manuscript.
PREFACE
T
his book emerges out of my experience teaching theology to under-
graduates. Although my students typically enjoy learning the ma-
terial, they often have difficulty relating it to their Christian lives. The
question appears like clockwork in nearly every course. What difference
does theology actually make for our lives? Often it appears during our
discussion of the doctrine of the Trinity, or perhaps while we are looking
at the distinctions that prompted the divisions of the Reformation. The
arguments of previous centuries seem archaic and irrelevant to the faith
of my students. Why does this matter? Convictions that prompted heated
debates and church divisions in the past seem unimportant today.
Shouldn’t we just focus on following Jesus? And my students are not the
only ones with these sorts of questions. I have found over the years that
many if not most Christians who study theology either have these same
questions or have had them at some point. I often ask them myself.
The fact that these kind of questions can be asked at all—and, more
importantly, the fact they are asked for sincere and substantive reasons—
reveals a problem in the way we teach and learn theology. It demonstrates,
for example, that the discipline of theology has become so divorced from
the everyday practices of the Christian life that it is difficult for smart and
committed Christians to figure out how they relate. It also reveals that the
long-acknowledged tension between the academic discipline of theology
and the life of discipleship to Jesus Christ may, in fact, be a great chasm.
